Playing their best baseball of the young season, the Kansas City Royals hope to see their dazzling pitching continue Thursday afternoon when they visit the Tampa Bay Rays.
Winners in the first two contests of the three-game series — and in eight of its past nine games — Kansas City has a chance to sweep Tampa Bay. Noah Cameron, the starter on Wednesday, took a no-hitter into the seventh inning of his major league debut, helping the Royals to a 3-0 win.
Cameron (1-0) wound up pitching 6 1/3 innings, giving up one hit, walking five and striking out three.
Kansas City, which ranks fourth in the majors with a 3.20 ERA, has allowed one run or less in four of its last five games.
Three of them were shutouts.
With the Royals looking to prolong that trend, right-hander Seth Lugo (2-3, 3.08 ERA) will start on Thursday. Lugo, 35, is coming off an eight-inning, three-hit shutout of the Houston Astros last Friday, when he struck out eight and walked just one. The Royals won 2-0.
“To me, that was probably the best game I’ve seen him pitch,” Royals manager Matt Quatraro said of Lugo’s most recent start. “His fastball had a ton of life, he was locating it, and he was incredibly sharp. The crispness of his pitches and the efficiency he was working with was incredible.”
In two career starts against Tampa Bay, Lugo is 2-0 with a 1.35 ERA.
For the Royals, it’s fortunate their pitching staff has been so stellar. Offensively, Kansas City has done just enough to get by over the past five games, as the Royals are averaging just 2.6 runs over the stretch. Bobby Witt Jr., however, extended his hitting streak to 21 games on Wednesday and is batting .322 for the year.
The Rays entered the mid-week series riding a five-game winning streak but have seen their offense falter over the first 18 innings against Kansas City. The loss on Wednesday was their fourth time being shut out at home this season.
“We could never really get anything going,” Rays manager Kevin Cash said. “The momentum was kind of in their favor. … We’ve got to find a way to come up and get the big hit. I trust that the guys will bounce back and find ways to get big hits with guys on base moving forward.”
Tampa Bay was 0-for-8 with runners in scoring position on Wednesday. Jonathan Aranda, who tallied one of the club’s four hits — all singles — leads the team with a .299 batting average, while Junior Caminero paces Tampa Bay with six home runs.
On the mound for the Rays on Thursday will be 25-year-old right-hander Shane Baz (3-0, 2.45 ERA), who’s coming off one of his best starts of the season. Baz threw seven scoreless innings, striking out six, walking one and giving up just four hits, last Friday in a 1-0 road victory over the San Diego Padres. Making the 29th start of his career, Baz will face the Royals for the first time.
A Kansas City victory in the series finale would mark its first sweep of Tampa Bay since May 30-June 1, 2016, and its first road sweep since August 1998.
–Field Level Media
